Openly confessed to killing cookies.Wanted:Alive: 200000000 + a cookie.Dead: 130000Please bring suspect directly to Cedar Nyx. She will deal with the punishment of this felony herself...BEWARE THE FRUIT KNIFE.

soadfa

I got the idea to host this topic here because I'm heavily thinking of starting a Youtube channel tackling the issue of self-defense from a legal perspective, and so I figured here would be a good place to discuss it from a philosophical perspective.

So, the base question of this topic is this: When, if ever, is an individual justified in committing violence (and to what extent) in the name of self-defense?

There are a couple of obvious baseline positions one could adopt, so I'll outline them here. Obviously, these positions I'm outlining are merely archetypal examples; very few people would fit neatly and exactly into the position I'll be describing, and there is a lot of nuance and internal variance in reality. That said, some baseline positions are:

Pacifism - An absolute pacifist would hold that an individual is never justified in using violence, even in self-defense. To a pacifist of this extreme variety, the only legitimate forms of resistance are passive forms of resistance. You may not harm someone to protect another. However, you may stand in between an attacker and victim, forcing the attacker to literally go through you first. Less extreme forms of pacifism would limit the prohibition to the use of lethal force, claiming that an individual is never justified in using lethal force against anyone else, even in self-defense, but is justified in responding to aggression with non-lethal forms of violent resistance. Philosophically, pacifistic positions tend to derive ethically from deontological takes on ethics, or from very rigid forms of virtue ethics (or even utilitarianism).

Martialism - This next position I'm outlining doesn't, to my knowledge, have a very widely-accepted name, so I'm going with the name I've heard for it that I like the most. Unlike the pacifist, the martialist views the application of force, even lethal force, to be legitimate as a means to defend oneself, to defend others, or to protect one's rights or prevent injustices. The martialist would view the pacifist's position as naive (or at least the extreme pacifist's position), and insist that the existence of any form of right and wrong necessitates judgement, and judgement implies enforcement. The martialist would not, however, insist that the use of violence to advance one's interests absent an external aggressor is in any way legitimate. Philosophically, martialist positions would be derived from utilitarian, natural law, or virtue takes on ethics.

Pre-Emptivism - This position is also one that doesn't, as far as I'm aware, have a widely accepted name. A pre-emptivist would claim that the use of force is legitimate not only in response to, but also pre-emptively of a threat to one's person or that of another. A form of this (whether those espousing it will acknowledge it or not) is the present-day trend of "punching Nazis." Why wait for the Nazis to do something violent? Just punch them before they can! (Of course, those who promote this kind of thing will usually try to make some kind of argument that the "Nazis" in question were actually the instigators because the speech acts of the "Nazis" count as violence or something like that.) This kind of thing is also fairly prominent on the international stage, although that gets away from individual self-defense and more into Just War Theory and debates there surrounding. This kind of position could be philosophically derived from a position of utilitarianism, natural law, or nihilism.

So yeah, those are three "baseline" positions on this issue, but of course there is a lot of variance and nuance among and between these positions, as well as entirely distinct positions that I will make no attempt to exhaustively account for.

So then, let's have at it, shall we? Where do you all fall on this issue, and why?

Well hello there. Given the friend feature on this particular mobile game, I thought it prudent to provide a place for everyone here to share their friend codes should they so choose. A record should/maybe will be kept on this first post. That means that I give permission to all other admins/mods to edit this post for the purpose of updating the record.

This is a topic that could basically be described as the "Daily Chat" of Philosophy Club.

This topic is meant to lead anywhere that it could naturally go. There is no "original topic" away from which the discussion mustn't stray. The only real restriction is that what you post should be philosophical in nature. Ideally, it should also stem from where the discussion was before you posted, but there's a lot of leeway in that.

Philosophy Club is here to host thoughtful, philosophical discussion over anything about which there can be philosophy, which is pretty much everything. Basically the point is to get those intellectual muscles moving, to make sure your beliefs are consistent, and to make sure your lives are self-examined. As Aristotle said (paraphrased), an examined life is the only one worth living.

So how do things work here in Philosophy Club?

In Philosophy Club we have discussions in the form of forum threads Within a given forum thread, which can be started by anyone in general good standing, anyone interested in Philosophy Club can discuss the topic. You can give your own thoughts, expand upon or critique the thoughts of others, ask questions or for clarification, pontificate and opine, etc, within the bounds of the topic.

Alright then, what are the rules of Philosophy Club?

While freedom of thought and discussion are definitely important in Philosophy Club, there are a few rules to make sure that the discussion is also quality.

1. Attack arguments, ideas, and beliefs, not people. For those of you with a basic understanding of logic, it shouldn't be surprising that ad hominem arguments are not the way to go in Philosophy Club. Basically, you can be harsh in discussion, viciously ripping into anything anyone says, but you can only rip into what they say. Attempts at character assassination, poisoning the well, blatant insults, threats, and (outright) bullying will not be tolerated. Civility is important. However, this brings us to the next rule...2. Have a generally thick skin. The point of Philosophy Club is not merely to state ideas: it is also to engage those ideas, and the foundation of engagement is criticism. If you can't handle the idea of having your beliefs questioned or your arguments criticized, this probably isn't the club for you. However, I encourage everyone to stay and be woken from your dogmatic slumbers rather than to run away. This is not a "safe space." No belief is unassailable.3. Stay on topic. Discussion is generally of higher quality when it is organized enough to stay on a topic long enough to develop it. While this is philosophy, and certainly there will be tangents and satellite questions that spawn from topics, try not to stray too far. Always bring it back to the original topic. If you find that the topic leads to a new and interesting but only slightly related question/discussion, start a new thread.4. Keep it serious (enough). This is not the place for trolling, spamming, and whimsical nonsense. While the seriousness of a discussion will vary depending on the topic at hand (e.g. a thread on the philosophy of humor would be a lot less serious than a thread on justice in warfare), we are here to discuss things, not to spam. You can crack jokes, point out ironies, etc, but make sure they're relevant and the post generally contributes to the discussion as it relates to the topic.5. If possible, cite your sources on empirical statements.

And that's all for the rules. I'll keep this topic updated as/if new rules need to be formulated.

Well, if you insist. I'm Soadfa, a longtime member of this forum, a former modsketeer, and generally one of the biggest dicks on the forum. I have a B.A. in philosophy as well as biology, and am currently attending law school. As such, I'm unfortunately rather busy. But if we get good discussions going on here, I'll probably be able to find SOME amount of time for them.

Hey Soadfa, I think we should ban everyone who believes--

This Club is not a safe space, and this Club does not endorse any particular school of thought in Philosophy. I may have philosophical beliefs, but Philosophy Club does not. As such, no one is getting banned (nor are posts getting deleted) based thereon.

So as some of you might have noticed, I haven't exactly been active lately... or for a long time. I have a few excuses, which I will provide, but I'm willing to admit right off the bat that this is my own fault.

But before I get into excuse-making, I suppose I'll first go through some updates, as the former will somewhat rely on the latter:

So I graduated from undergrad in December, and am now a proud holder of a Bachelor's Degree in Biology and Philosophy. During the latter half of that final semester, I decided on a whim to take the LSAT, and with no preparation of any sort scored a 171, which for those of you who know little to nothing about the LSAT, is in the 98th percentile. As such, I pretty much abandoned my plans to take the MCAT (about which I am much less confident), and have instead been going through the law school application process. I've so far been accepted into two law schools (with quite generous scholarships offered to me), been waitlisted by two, rejected by one (which I fully expected; it was way out of my league given my transcript [my LSAT score is the good half of my application]), and am waiting to hear back from three. In the meantime, I have been working full time to support myself in this area, because fuck going home. The nature of my work is unimpressive, given that it was mostly a matter of getting a job fast and for only a relatively short time.

To sum up my excuses, I've been very busy applying to law schools and working.

Now, you may be wondering as to the nature of this post in The Door: Am I posting to say that I'm back, or that I'll be leaving forever, or some other thing? The answer is along the lines of some other thing. I can't really say that I'll be that much more active, only that I'm going to try. I especially can't attest to my activity when I actually start law school in the Fall, no matter where I end up going.

But I want to post hear just to let everyone (or at least the section of everyone about whom I give a damn) know that I haven't forgotten about this place. I haven't really taken a deep look at the site yet, so I don't know who's still here, who's gone, who's new, or anything like that. But if there is anyone who I like left, this is a message to them.